dialect, which occurs in some public decrees still extant, remained for a long time Doric.(491) The Byzantians, together with the Chalcedonians, either at the time of the expedition of Darius against the Scythians, or of the Ionic revolt, founded Mesambria on the Pontus,(492) which some consider as a colony of Megara. The Megareans had also founded Selymbria even before the settlement of Byzantium,(493) and probably carried on from this place a war with the Samians at Perinthus,(494) when that island was still governed by Geomori, before the time of Polycrates. Moreover, the Megareans had a large share in the founding of Heraclea on the Pontus; for although they were strengthened by some Tanagræans from Bœotia, their numbers so predominated that this city was in general considered as Doric.(495) 10. Megara, however, at the same time founded some very considerable colonies to the west, viz., in Sicily. It will be sufficient to state in general terms that Hybla in Sicily was a Megarean colony, established in the 13th Olympiad (about 728 B.C.), and was even called Megara.(496) It probably kept up a constant intercourse with the mother-state; since Theognis, who was a Megarean from Sicily, according to Plato, dwelt nevertheless for a long time in the Megara near Athens, to which state many of his poems refer.(497) The founding of the small town of Trogilus, and of the more important city of Thapsos, preceded the building of Megara. A century later, some inhabitants of Megara founded Selinus in the neighbourhood of that part of the island, which town was in early times held by the Phœnicians, in later times by the Carthaginians.